Sargasso by Kathy George

Author:Kathy George
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: HQ Fiction
Published: 2020-12-21T00:00:00+00:00

25

________

Now

I don’t remember getting down from the rooftop.

I reach the bottom of the staircase at the same time as he leaps up the hallway stairs.

He crosses the landing in three swift moves and bails me up against the wall.

‘Hannah,’ he says, breathlessly. He’s so close I can see spittle on his lips, and how his gaze keeps shifting from my eyes to my mouth. Under my hand his chest is warm and pulsing with life, as if he’s run several kilometres.

I gaze up at him, yearning for him to kiss me. Why’s it not happening? Is he too shy?

Instead, he lifts one hand and cups the side of my face. ‘I love you,’ he says. ‘I love you, Hannah Prendergast.’

‘Oh, Flint,’ I cry, and still he doesn’t kiss me! If anything, he leans back out of reach, as if he knows I want him and is making me wait.

‘Whatshisface,’ he says. ‘We have to tell him. You have to break it off with him first. I can’t … I can’t kiss you’—he says it like they’re foreign words—‘until I know you’re completely mine.’

‘Really?’ I sigh deeply. ‘I suppose you’re right.’ But all the same I reach up and put my hands around his neck and press myself against his hard, strong body and at least he doesn’t stop me doing that. Swooning with desire, as I am.

After a bit, I move my face so that we look deeply into one another’s eyes. His eyes are vivid green with intensity, his expression utterly serious—but strangely apprehensive. And I can’t, for the life of me, fathom this out. What is he afraid of?

‘Where’ve you been?’ I say.

‘Where’ve you been?’ he answers.

*

I don’t mention the previous days. I don’t mention what Bec told me. What we have is too fragile. It takes a lot of strength but I carry on as if the time without him means nothing. We paint and work and josh around, but things aren’t like they were before. For one thing, I can’t bear to let him out of my sight. For another, I’m going to have to talk to him. I can’t have a relationship with someone who isn’t here half the time. I have to feel secure.

I go downstairs late in the afternoon and check my phone. It says 4.32 pm and I stand at the bottom of the stairs and call to Flint to pack up and come down. I have a voice message, a private number, and I move to the patio to listen to it.

Phillip, Bernie’s brother-in-law, says Bernie hasn’t had a heart attack, they know that much. The hospital is still doing tests apparently. He says Bernie would like to see me, and will I please call him, Phillip, to arrange a time to visit.

*

Over dinner, which we eat at the card table, I tell Flint what happened to Bernie, and about Phillip.

‘… And Phillip left a message,’ I say. ‘Bernie wants to see me again.’

Flint cuts into his vegetable lasagna. ‘This is good,’ he says, forking up another mouthful.

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